Saturday, May 5th, 2007...6:46 am
That’s Regent Martinez to You Pal. Regent Martinez Three…
Hey, I’ve got a buddy on the State Board of Regents now. This week, David Martinez III of Marana was confirmed as Student Regent, and he gets to serve on that august body for a year.
His road to confirmation was not smooth, however. I know it’s shocking for a candidate for Student Regent, but Martinez has been involved in politics on campus. Next thing you know, one of our universities will hire an English professor who has been known to write. A couple of Senators expressed a concern that he had been a leader in the Young Democrats and even, -gasp-, interned for Raúl Grijalva. Folks that objected, particularly Linda Gray, were careful to couch this as his being “too political,” but it is difficult to see how someone uninterested in politics would have their name be considered for this position. Was the trouble really that he was involved in politics, or that he was involved in Democratic politics? Hands up everyone who thinks that someone who was as involved in the College Republicans who interned for Jon Kyl would have had to go through this gauntlet.
Martinez has also been active in various campus GLBT organizations. Gray and others got caught up on the “T” and wondered if this cause problems on the Board. I’m a bit lost on what this concern was all about. Martinez is not transgendered, and would not look good in a dress anyway (sorry, David).
One of the concerns that was afoot was that Martinez has not graduated “on time.” Well, our legislators might be suprised to learn this, but fewer and fewer students are graduating in four years. You know why? Well, the cuts in financial aid, at both the state and federal level, have made it more difficult for some students to take “full loads” every semester. Also, budget cuts usually result in layoffs for graduate teaching assistants that teach lower division classes. It can make it difficult to graduate on time when classes you need for graduation are simply not available some semesters because of the lack of teaching assistants. Having someone with personal experience with these issues would be valuable on the Board.
Well, even with all of that, Martinez is now a Regent. Congratulations, David.
NB - The Daily Wildcat supported Martinez and ran a strong editorial in his favor.
3 Comments
May 5th, 2007 at 11:30 am
It’s not suprising that someone of David’s background, given that he seems to come from Democratic values, has been scrutinized in the way that he has. I mean come on, we all know that it’s the Republican culture of corruption that is still ever present and ever pervasive. Complete and utter loyalty to the Party is just as dangerous as the German Reich and the Soviet Union, I shudder to make the comparisons, tis is true in the Bush world though. We have an ally on the Board of Regents now, thus let us begin the process of preventing them from continuing the slight but ever increasing tuition rates every semester. They think we can’t add but I know they sit around thinking s*** up, let us split 40 percent into 6 semesters, that’ll do. They keep doing that at the K-20 level then we really can’t add, I’m sure that’s their aim. David, congrats, let us prevail
May 5th, 2007 at 1:58 pm
DM3 - Congrats on the confirmation!!! That is awesome…
I’m so proud of our YD leaders…
May 6th, 2007 at 1:02 pm
What you said about budget cuts was right on, Ted. Classes are harder to get at the U. of A. and with the recent round of cuts, it is going to get harder and harder. I would only add that the U. of A. also suffers from a lack of advisers and individuals in undergraduate programming as well. Lack of classes, lack of direction toward major advising, and lack of financial aid, makes graduating much much harder.
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